This Is Life Now
by haveyouseenmyhaggis
Summary: Something breaks down every haphazard wall I build around myself. It's like trying to defend a castle with a cotton wool fence. Gwen struggles to come to terms with losing her friends. Spoilers for Children of the Earth.


**Title: This Is Life Now**

**Summary: Something breaks down every haphazard wall I build around myself. It's like trying to defend a castle with a cotton wool fence. Gwen struggles to come to terms with losing her friends. Spoilers for **_**Children of the Earth. **_

**Author's Note: This just needed to be written, so here it is. Enjoy. **

**Disclaimer: I do not own **_**Torchwood. **_

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Something breaks down every haphazard wall I build around myself. Every single hastily thrown up barricade seems so fragile now. It's like trying to defend a castle with a cotton wool fence. No matter how much I try to cover up the cracks in the wall, everything still seeps through and - like hot water - it burns me. I would move away from the source of the burning, but I don't know what it is. All I can feel is something clenching my heart tightly and refusing to let go no matter how much I try and push it away.

I think it is better not to tell anyone so I remain silent and focus on holding myself together. I have a baby to think about, after all. Rhys understands how I feel and sometimes that's all I need to make me feel safe. Most of the time I'm all right. I can be freely happy. I can smile and laugh and then it hits me again. I remember Ianto and my heart breaks for him and for Jack. They'd been so happy together recently and now…? Now that had been snatched from them. I miss them all so much: Owen, Tosh, Ianto and Jack. They were great. I knew Torchwood was a dangerous job from the beginning but I never thought I'd lose everyone so quickly. Sometimes it's just too much to even begin to think about.

"Are you okay?" people ask, not knowing what's going on inside my head. I pause for a moment. No, I'm not okay. I'm really not. Help me. "Yes," I say eventually, "Yes, I'm fine." Sometimes I don't even think. I just say it. It's an automatic response. Maybe if I keep saying it, it'll be true. Yeah, right, Gwen.

I'm told that Talking is good. Everyone is there if I need to Talk. I have no words to say. What is there left to say? I'm hurting. What more is there than that? Even if I did speak, who the hell would believe me? People are still denying the whole alien thing despite the fact their kids were taken away from them. I can just imagine the scene, "Hello Mr Therapist. My name is Gwen Cooper. I worked for Torchwood Three. My boss couldn't die and he got blown to pieces only to grow back together. I lost my closest friends. One died and the other ran away to travel the universe. Oh, and I'm pregnant." I'm no expert but I'm pretty sure there aren't many therapists who know how to deal with a situation like that. It all seems so… surreal? I guess that'd be the right word. It's like it isn't happening. I keep waiting to wake up from a nightmare I know is very much real.

I'm waiting for something. I know that much. I'm waiting for some sort of answer but it doesn't come. How can there be an answer for an unknown question? I keep telling myself I'm fine. I've done all I can do. Now it's just time to keep going but when I think about it, I don't feel anything at all and I hate myself. I hate myself for being so cold. I think of little memories. Happy things. Sad things. Nothing happens inside me. There are no tears in my eyes. Am I a monster? Am I really that heartless? I used to be so sensitive. Now I think I must be some sort of rock. Nobody could feel so little and still be human, surely? Torchwood does that to people. I used to think it was the best job in the world and now I hate it for what it did to my life – for what it did to me. I cannot deny that I've changed and Torchwood did that to me. I used to think it was a good change – that I was smarter, braver and much more confident but now I'm not so sure.

I've never seen Jack so broken as I did then. He was just empty. He begged for me to be taken home but the look in his eyes since he lost Ianto…? He's not the man I once loved. He's someone different. A ghost. For a long time he didn't even speak. It was like there was nothing he had left to say. He loses so much and there's nothing I can do to help him. He'll lose me too someday. Then again, maybe he already has. Maybe that's what he thinks.

Rhys doesn't know what to say about it so he says nothing but at least he understands what I'm going through because he was there too. He offers only a sympathetic hug and cups of coffee. He says we should focus on the future though, on our baby. What scares me most is that I don't understand death. I find myself thinking about things that I thought I understood. What happens after death? Where do people go? I used to think I knew but again, Torchwood made me doubt all of that.

I look at my face in the mirror and sigh. I look tired. I glance down at my swollen belly and smile slightly. At least there's something good for us to hold on to. Soon Rhys and I will have a little baby girl or boy and life will carry on. We'll have to be a "normal" family unit for him or her. We'll be proper parents for our child. We'll carry on living our lives and remember the friends we lost because sometimes that's all you can do. This is life now.


End file.
